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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (July 7, 2017)
PAGE 10 | July 7, 2017 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS New life for a replacement I-5 bridge over the Columbia River VANCOUVER, Wash.— Some Southwest Washington legisla- tors, transportation officials, union officials, small business owners, and political and com- munity activists met June 22 in an effort to breathe new life into replacing the aging and con- gested Interstate 5 lift-span bridges that connect Portland and Vancouver. The meeting was coordinated by the I-5 Bridge Replacement Group, an organization formed more than three years ago by members of the Labor Round- table of Southwest Washington to thank supporters of the de- funct Columbia River Crossing (CRC) project. But the group never stopped trying to build community consensus for a re- placement bridge. The need for the project hasn’t changed. And the need to do something hasn’t changed, said Bob Schaefer, a former state legislator from Clark County and a co-founder of the group. “We’ve got all the back- ground. We’ve got all the stud- ies. We need to have dialogue to build consensus on a project that can move forward, and still pro- vide a benefit that everyone needs,” Schaefer told the Labor Press. The group has now focused its attention on getting replace- ment of the I-5 bridge desig- nated as a “project of statewide significance” in both Washing- ton and Oregon. Doing so would allow the construction permit- ting process to be expedited. Earlier this year, the Washing- ton Legislature passed a bill that directs the Washington Depart- ment of Transportation (WDOT) to review and document all of the work that went into the planning of the CRC. The purpose is to give lawmakers some idea as to what work is still valid, what work needs to be re-done, and what might be the best path for- ward to replace the I-5 bridge. Senate Bill 5806 requires WDOT to report its findings to the Washington Legislature by Dec. 1 — along with a recom- mendation as to whether it should be designated as a project of statewide significance. Additionally, the bill calls for creation of a 16-member legisla- tive action committee comprised of lawmakers from Washington and Oregon, with the first meet- ing to be held no later than Dec. 15, 2017. Washington lawmak- ers allocated $350,000 to con- duct the work. Snarled traffic on the Interstate 5 Bridge is a daily occurrence. Whether Oregon lawmakers will get on board is still not clear. The Oregon Legislature wraps up its 2017 session on July 10. The I-5 Bridge Replacement Group invited Kris Strickler, re- gional administrator for WDOT, to its meeting June 22 to discuss what needs to happen in order to get an I-5 replacement bridge “shovel-ready.” Attending the meeting were Washington state Sen. Annette Cleveland (who drafted SB 5806), state Rep. Sharon Wylie, a representative for U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, Vancouver Mayor pro-tem Anne McEnerny-Ogle, Matt Ransom, executive director of the Regional Transportation Council, union officials from Teamsters, Carpenters, Laborers, and the Southwest Washington Central Labor Council, two rep- resentatives from the Cowlitz In- dian Tribe, and others. Before it was scrapped in 2014, the CRC had secured all of the necessary permits to begin construction — including an En- vironmental Impact Statement (EIS) and hard-to-get permits from the Coast Guard and Fed- eral Aviation Administration. Any replacement bridge go- ing forward, Strickler said, would have to get new permits or refresh old permits for all of the work — but not necessarily Low Prices! Mon-Fri 9-6, Sat 9:30-5:30, Sun 12-6 from scratch. “If we have one project that applied for a permit and received a permit, and that project changes, we do have to go back and get those permits again,” he said. “It doesn’t mean you start from ground zero. What it means is, you start from the point where the change occurs and you have that discussion with those re- source agencies.” Strickler said all of the previ- ous technical work on the CRC “was based on solid foundation by solid experts from multiple agencies.” He acknowledged, however, that the process to re- new or refresh the permits will take a significant amount of ef- fort and time—possibly two or three years. And there is no doubt a new bridge project will have changes. The failed CRC in- cluded a five-mile stretch of freeway, multiple interchanges and light-rail extension, in addi- tion to a single bridge with six through lanes (three lanes North, and three lanes South) and four auxiliary lanes. [The current I-5 bridge is actually two bridges. The northbound bridge is 100 years old. The south- bound bridge was built in 1958. Both are liftspans, and both have three lanes.] It came with a price tag of $3.6 billion. The federal government had committed to pick up the $850 million cost for light rail, so long as Oregon and Washington each ponied up $450 million. The re- mainder of the financing was to come from tolls. In 2013, the Democrat-con- trolled Oregon Legislature ap- proved spending $450 million. But in Washington, Republican state Sens. Don Benton of Van- couver and Ann Rivers of La Center blocked a bill that would have allocated its portion of the financing. Had the bill got to the floor, it would have passed. The following year, Oregon’s then-Gov. John Kitzhaber, a De- mocrat, tried to go it alone with a scaled-down bridge project. In the 2014 short session of the Legislature, HB 4113 had ma- jority support in the House, but not in the Senate. When the ses- sion adjourned without a bill, the Oregon Department of Transportation officially shut down the project. Federal funding went away, and not much has been done since 2014. All of the previous technical work on the CRC “was based on solid foundation by solid experts from multiple agencies.”
